Student project blog exploring the themes of anxiety and how it can be understood and portrayed through symbolism.
Semester 2 project at Duncan and Jordanstone college of art.

Wednesday, 6 March 2013

Development - Progress of sketchbooks and props

In the meantime I've also been working further on sketchbooks and props for some new Photo shoots. Theirs been a bit of trouble with materials and budget but getting there slowly but surely. Been jumping between doing digital work in photo shop as well as getting back into drawing for the development sketchbook.

Sketchbook Work

This is me been working on pages that are studies of the props and their symbolism meanings that are included in my pictures. I plan to decorate and paint the pages and make a self reference symbolism book/guide and include it in the sketchbook because of time and other work that's needed to be done. But it's helped me get back into drawing and it's made a better work flow so I can work on things away from a computer.

Prop Making

I've been making a lot of the props myself and finding different ways to make them in the ways I want them for the shoots. I've been creating a mixed media sink for one of the next photo shoot ideas. The idea is to represent the environment of a bathroom area and the sketch below is what I plan the storyboard to be of. The masks have been painted and ready for a while and the tiles and mirror has been collected as well. Have been preparing a place/studio to be able to set it up as well as finding out how to create the pieces on the wall.

Started to create the sink by painting a piece of card board with poster/acrylic paint and then measured out a hole in the middle with a sliver bowl. The bowl will be used in place to create the dip in the sink. I tried to create the dip with tracing paper since it can be shaped but it was to delicate and ripped a lot which made me turn to something stronger.

I created the taps by using newspaper and tin foil and shaped them with tape and the paper. I did this to keep the feel of the media apparent hopefully in the finished pictures. To keep a sort of surreal feel instead of using the actual parts the crafts are representing. All the photographs are going to become pretty surreal in nature as it is and feel the props that are self made are adding a extra touch. Also that getting an actual sink will be very heavy and more expensive to achieve and buy.

For another picture I've been wanting to create a type of window that was see through but that could add other medias to it and control them. I have had a lot of trouble with trying to do this since I didn't know how to start creating it or even what materials to use. At the start I looked into things such as fish tanks and even tanks they use for keeping pet ants. But they caused issues such as size, weight and price that caused more problems as well as time. So decided to try and create it myself and asked around the workshop and the University's art store. It was a bit expensive as well but I ended up finding a type of plastic that was thick enough and clear enough.

Measured and used a metal ruler and a normal scalpel and used a bit of force and managed to cut the plastic into strips. I put them together and used some pressure to push the pieces together and used a all purpose glue which worked amazingly for the purpose.

It ended up being the right size and I'm very happy with the results and it even stands up on its own which is what I wanted as well. Just have to do some tests with medias inside it such as paint/ink and maybe other props that might be successful. Also have a model ready for this shoot just need to arrange a photo shoot and studio soon.

Felt made some good progress with these props despite the difficulties at the start but just need to get into a studio and set them up now. Will continue with sketchbooks and I got some prints for my first photo shoots done as well. I'll try to arrange some new shoots this week if not will try for next week.